5 things that work at my school

1. New discipline rules. Post-pandemic, we, like many schools, struggled with discipline. “Give grace” was the mantra during the pandemic, but that only created little monsters. Many of our students forgot how to function as humans in society. So we, that is, the discipline committee at my high school, got together and made a plan. Enforce the rules. Be consistent. Be fair. Don’t slack. And it worked.
2. High standards. So you want to take AP classes? Do dual enrollment? An internship? Well, your grades are good enough. So, no.
3. Celebrating sports other than football. Ok, our football team is bad and they’re still the social event of every Friday in the fall, but compared with 15 or 20 years ago our school is much, much better at celebrating big wins and playoff results from our other sports than it once was.
4. Celebrating achievement from non-athletic competitions. Again, years ago we had students and teachers that didn’t know we had any non-athletic competitors doing great things(and they were!).
5. Inclusivity. This winter our school started up a Co-ed Bocce team. Now it is special among all our varsity sports that it is both co-ed, but also mixed with regular education and special education students. So a student who might never get a chance to compete and earn a varsity letter has their place. That’s very cool.

That’s my five. What five cool things does your school do well?